Youre probably thinking, Ive seen this movie before: West Texas boy makes middling grades in college, gets elected governor and  to the consternation of gobsmacked Democrats, who misunderestimate his folksy appeal  runs for the Republican nomination for president. But if thats all you know about Rick Perry, you should be asking whether the country is ready for another White House occupant from the Lone Star State. The fact is, the most recent entrant into the GOP race is nothing like the caricatures being promoted on the left and the right. Here are some myths that need debunking, and quick.

1. Hes a Bush clone.

Biographical similarities aside, Perry is not the second coming of George W. Bush, either stylistically or substantively. Bush governed Texas with a light touch and had a good relationship with the Democratic majorities in both chambers of the Texas legislature. Perry is more hard-knuckled in his dealings not only with Democrats (now a minority in the House and the Senate) but with insufficiently conservative Republicans  what we in Texas pejoratively call moderates......

2. Hes a hillbilly dimwit.

Thats bias against Texas, pure and simple. Just because he wears cowboy boots and drops his Gs doesnt mean hes a dummy. Perry may be a small-town boy who went to an ag school (Texas A&M University), but hes an extremely cagey and strategic politician who has been among the states most successful governors at getting what he wants. (Put another way: Even if hes not book smart by University of Chicago standards, hes plenty street smart  and street smart is still smart.) The better lens through which to regard Perry is inside vs. outside, establishment vs. anti-establishment, elitist vs. jus folks. Dont make the mistake of thinking that jus folks is jus dumb.

Perry,, elected to the Texas House of Representatives in 1984, came to be known as one of the "Pit Bulls," members who sat in the lower pit of the House Appropriations Committee and bitterly fought spending increases.

.She tries to help the governor not get too carried away with his own role. "I try to keep him grounded. Sometimes I wonder," she said. When he gets a little too puffed up, "I'm always saying: 'Who told you that you were cute today?' "

Still, she intends to get out on the campaign trail and play a more visible part.

"Not that I'm a vote-changer or a vote-getter or anything like that," she said. "But I'll do whatever I need to do because I think it's important that he get re-elected."

You have to grow thick skin, enjoy people, tackle big projects and, in all of it, keep family as a priority, she said.

The governor has also set his priorities. The staff knows to keep his schedule clear every Sept. 9. That's not his wedding day or an important birthday.

Perry could count on one hand the number of trips he had taken out of his home state by the time he graduated from Texas A&M University, but everything changed when he joined the Air Force.

Flying C-130s, Perry lived in Germany and Saudi Arabia. He flew in Central and South America, North Africa and all over Europe.

"I saw all of these different types of governments and I made the connections to how the people acted and looked, and it became abundantly clear to me that, at that particular point in time, that America was this very unique place and that our form of democracy was very rare," Perry said. " ... That was the greatest gift I received from my years of being in the military, and they really shaped my outlook on the rest of my life."

.....Upon graduation, he was commissioned in the United States Air Force, completed pilot training and flew C-130 tactical airlift in the United States, the Middle East, and Europe until 1977. He left the Air Force with the rank of captain, returned to Texas and went into business farming cotton with his father.

In 1982, Perry married Anita Thigpen, his childhood sweetheart whom he had known since elementary school. They have two children, Griffin and Sydney.

For starters, the Wasington Post praising a Republican? (looking over shoulder for ELE Asteroid) That doesn't happen.

Second, Gardasil. Doing what you think is right without regard for the Constitution or individual Rights smacks of the sort of 'ends justify the means' mentality we're seeing out of DC now. I don't need any more of that, no matter how well intentioned.

Illegal aliens are, by virtue of being here illegally, doing something illegal. (D'oh.) Regardless of other criminal acts, that is one, and one should be enough.

Islam isn't our friend, although it might play nice to get more of what it wants before the vests go on and the bombs go off.

EVERY, yes, every candidate needs to come under the microscope.

This isn't some d@mned Texas A&M game (kindly save the pep-rally for after the vetting), this is the election which will likely decide the future of this country.

We've all seen candidates who made the 'right' moves, did the 'right' things, said the 'right' stuff, and did not deliver.

We've seen people promise the moon and stars, and when the election is over, they moon you.

We don't have the time to diddle around with another term or two of half-fast measures and sentiments.

As for Gov. Perry, I'm glad he knows which end of the horse is which. That way, there'll be no excuse for being on the wrong end of things.

I haven't made up my mind, but I'm seeing as much not to like as there is to like, and much which could be 'packaged' either way.

But my impression remains that he is the one to split the Bachmann vote and get Mitt the nod.

4
posted on 08/20/2011 1:44:56 AM PDT
by Smokin' Joe
(How often God must weep at humans' folly. Stand fast. God knows what He is doing.)

The msm likes him so my knee-jerk reaction is to question. It aint right. It's not a question of where's the catch, it's how many catches are there? They seem to be geared up to protect him until he defeats the ‘other’ republicans in his field. A weak opponent is needed. They like him, ergo I question.

Perry made headlines during the 2009 legislative session when he turned down $555 million in federal stimulus funding to extend unemployment insurance , citing the strings attached, and he has made a talking point out of the failed stimulus. But Texas took more than $17 billion in stimulus money in 2009 to balance the budgets from that biennium and the previous one. Perry defends the decision by saying Texas is a donor state  and, true enough, it sends more money to Washington than it gets back in benefits and services  but the fact is, he kept the state solvent by taking what he now rails against.

5. He has presided over an unqualified economic miracle.

When Perry says Texas has less than 10 percent of the nations population but has created more than 40 percent of its jobs in the past two years, or that more jobs have been created in Texas in the past decade  that is, on his watch  than in all 49 other states combined, hes not exaggerating. In an election thats likely to be about jobs and the economy first and foremost, he has quite a record to run on. But theres more to the story than those top-line statistics.

The unemployment rate in Texas, for instance, was 8.4 percent as of Friday  less than the federal unemployment rate but worse than that of 25 other states, and it could move up a tick or two after Sept. 1, when budget cuts passed during the most recent legislative session will reduce the public employee rolls. Texas has more minimum-wage jobs than every state other than Mississippi, a superlative you brag about if you dont care about what kind of jobs you create and are only trying to run up the numbers. And growth in public sector (i.e., government) jobs in Texas has been 19 percent over the past 10 years, vs. just 9 percent growth in private-sector jobs.

The argument about minimum wage jobs is goofy. A job a job and in Illinois we've got black unemployment in double digits and in some demographics it reaches near 50%. We could use more minimum wage jobs, but the above items are worth noting.

There isn't going to be the perfect conservative candidate, if there was one he/she wouldn't be electable. We're going to have to compromise and keep our eye on the prize - Congress.

Taking Congress is the most important and by margins that insulate us from Obama.

When details of the plan became public, critics became concerned that it would lead to a NAFTA Superhighway that would facilitate the United States, Canada and Mexico merging into a North American Union (a fringe conspiracy theory).

A remarkable statement, considering that city commissions in this neck of the woods were bubbling with excitement about proximity to the NAFTA Superhighway up into Canada--it is part of the old Agenda 21 UN thingy which can still be found on the UN website. Not just a "conspiracy theory", but the real deal.

So, what am I smoking? Nothing.

I am concerned that someone being presented as a Conservative would have even considered either mandating a vaccine (even if you could opt out, provided you jumped through the hoops), and the TTC, which was to connect with the rest of the NAFTA highway, warts and all. The latter reeks of the sort of abuse of eminent domain we are seeing in the EPA and other agencies who are still busy snapping up more land.

Now, those may have been errors in judgement (political 'growing pains'), or they may have been the tip of a well concealed iceberg. No one is going to convince me either way quickly, and, for those who might feel so inclined, neither snarky comments nor spamming me will alter my decision to observe and learn more.

This is America and folks are free to jump on whatever bandwagon they want to--or to look before they leap.

I'm not deriding anyone, but when Mitt flagged in the polls behind Bachmann, Perry threw his hat in the ring.

Hmmmm.

Looking outside this box, the country-clubbers' last chance to snatch the control of the party from us 'miserable TEA party ruffians' is to get Romney back in the lead. Perry might be able to split the vote, not on the Country Club side, but 'in the sticks' and let Mitt slide by. Just a thought.

I just haven't decided yet, but there is something there that just doesn't flange up for me, and I'm not done looking.

14
posted on 08/20/2011 2:47:25 AM PDT
by Smokin' Joe
(How often God must weep at humans' folly. Stand fast. God knows what He is doing.)

Smith is not praising the Governor. He manages to end with a smear every time. Not surprising, since this is the guy from the NPR/UT online news that took money from George Soros this year.

The jobs smear is especially bad. Texas’ unemployment would be 2.3% if it weren’t for all the people moving to Texas. Our median income hits just about the same as the average in the US;$15 or so, meaning that a lot of those jobs must pay very well. The fact that we do have so many employed affects that “most minimum wage jobs” number.

I don't need details to support my opinion. I try to limit my bs intake. I didn't attack Perry, I am simply skeptical. The more I hear about him from less informed sources, the more concern I generate. I am skeptical by nature, but this guy has my bs meter going in every direction.

Even if you rounded them all up and sent them back across the border, it would be wasting money you could be spending keeping them from coming here in the first place. What needs to be done is seal the border. Then you wouldn't have the trouble sending them back every time they came back in.

The Texas-Mexico border is 1256 miles long. That's farther than the distance between New York and New Orleans. To seal that border would require resources more than Texas could bear. Governor Perry has begged for federal assistance from the Obama regime. There has been no answer from Zer0. So, the border situation lingers as the State of Texas tries to deal with the situation the best they can. One thing for certain, it will cost more money that the state of Texas has.

Terri Hall is the founder of the San Antonio Toll Party and Texans Uniting for Reform and Freedom. She started a taxpayer revolt upon learning of plans to convert Highway 281 into a tollway and charge taxpayers again for what they already built and paid for. TURF's grassroots efforts halted two freeway-to-tollway projects, curbed plans for the Trans Texas Corridor, defeated bad bills with runaway taxation in the Texas Legislature, opposed using federal stimulus money to build toll roads, and awakened Texas to the coming infrastructure bubble and bailouts. Whether speaking before community groups of all types, the Legislature in Austin, at rallies in Washington D.C. or on CNN, Terri is a tireless taxpayer advocate. She invites you to learn more and to join the fight at Texas Turf Org

*******************************

There's more to the story (Isn't that always the case?) about David Stall and his wife and his political bid and crawling into bed with environmentalists and others.

CorridorBotch.org, or David Stall-ed ..........>>>If everything with which these CW.org miseducators, and their brethren in groups such as Texas Toll Party, have been frightening or angering these poor residents into intellectual submission were true, the TTC would be a slab of concrete spanning from Beaumont east to El Paso west, and pave the state in totality between San Antonio and Dallas.

Every town to which these people pay a visit is told that they are in dire danger of being diametrically bifurcated by the coming highway, no matter how far east or west they might be. To cite but one fraudulent example, residents of every single city, town and village along the Taylor-Manor corridor have been regaled with egregiously fabricated tales of municipalitive destruction and vociferous eminent domain pillaging.

The problem is, Corridor Watch et. al. are by no means allowing the facts to get in the way of a good beating. Every proposed path (and there are still at the very least three) currently under consideration places the TTC on the northern and southern ends of planned SH-130, which is a good fifteen miles west of the villes in question and in crisis over their alleged impending devastation.

That these Corridor clowns are asserting anything with certitude belies their veracity on all things, because right now NO ONE outside of the TxDoT TTC circle knows anything about any aspect of the plans ..

There are attending political ramifications to all of this, which is rarely the case when one is discussing a candidate who garnered a mere 8% of the interest of the citizenry. For there is a distinct waft of Strayhorn in the air surrounding the empty Stall and his Corridor Watch.

Comptroller Carole Keeton McClellan Rylander Strayhorn, currently adrift on signature collection waters in her bid for Independent Gubernatorial validity, has been a fixture at CW.org events, railing prodigiously (yet without substance) against the TTC, and the very concept of toll roads.

But herein arises a consistent theme when discussing Madame Comptroller; her inconsistency. Because prior to her decision to run against the TTC-proposing Governor Rick Perry, she too saw the meritoriousness of the concept of consumption road funding.<<< ......

***************

FReeper Reaganez: Building roads for commerce is an absolute responsiblity of government.

(After reading Aug 20, 2011 article linked above) Seems there's a problem......Maybe it's time for another solution -- like the one the "environmentalists" killed that's strangling business and commerce.

The jobs smear is especially bad. Texas unemployment would be 2.3% if it werent for all the people moving to Texas.

Yep, I can sympathize. We have extremely low unemployment here, even Walmart stockers are making $12 and getting over 40 hrs/week. There are jobs all over the paper, but not many places to live if you get one (and housing is darned expensive--$2000/mo for a two-bedroom apt.), and our weather isn't conducive to camping out.

Another factor is population: we have just over 700,000 people in a slow year, Texas has a lot more. To drop our unemployment a percentage point takes fewer jobs, because there are fewer people to start with. Yep, we've been mobbed by folks from elsewhere--about the only 'new arrival' license plate I haven't seen is Hawaii. But the limiting factors of housing and our famous winters keep that from becoming excessive.

An awful lot of that is oil-related, or spinoff jobs which exist because of the oil patch being busy here. The 191 rigs running here keep jobs going elsewhere, too--we see where the tools come out of on the shipping manifests.

24
posted on 08/20/2011 3:31:03 AM PDT
by Smokin' Joe
(How often God must weep at humans' folly. Stand fast. God knows what He is doing.)

I actually just sent the author an email, because the quoted statement couldn’t be more hopelessly wrong (as Curtis Sliwa says).

Aside from the facts that Bush and Perry are about the same age, flew planes for our defense, have been gov. of texas and each married once with 2 children, there is NOTHING similar in their bios at all.

I keep reading things like this, it is way off base, and it just annoys me.

The Bush family is one of the most preeminent families in American politics. They are very wealthy. George Bush’s father was the POTUS!

Rick Perry’s father was a cotton farmer.

As I said to Mr. Evans, it says great things about America that anyone could mistake these 2 men as having “similar” biographies, but the fact of the matter is, they don’t.

I’m not saying either is better than the other, by virtue of their backgrounds or for any other reason. But, they come from different places, and I don’t know why anyone would want to try and hide or distort that.

I doubt the author was attempting to distort things, I think he was just thoughtless. He probably meant to say, despite outward similarities, that would have been OK.

But, as I said, I keep seeing this same meme and it’s just not correct.

J.R. Ray Perry and his wife Amelia, now in their mid-80s, still reside in Paint Creek in the house Ray built.

......>>>The heart of the community is Paint Creek School, which was established in 1937 and has an enrollment of about 160, about 50 more than when Perry attended. "No Dream too Tall for a School so Small" is the school motto.<<<<..... Rick Perry's roots in little Paint Creek run deep

The other issue in item 5, is the unemployment rate. Another article I read analyzed why it is that high when there are so many jobs being created. The answer, unemployed people are moving to Texas, seeking a job. The other state’s unemployment goes down, Texas’ rate goes up. Even with that, enough jobs are found to keep Texas below the national average.

Your point about the minimum wage jobs is right on. Go to Illinois or Michigan’s legislature and say, “my franchised restaurant will move to your state and bring in 50,000 minimum wage jobs”. Would they turn you down?

The other issue in item 5, is the unemployment rate. Another article I read analyzed why it is that high when there are so many jobs being created. The answer, unemployed people are moving to Texas, seeking a job. The other state’s unemployment goes down, Texas’ rate goes up. Even with that, enough jobs are found to keep Texas below the national average.

Your point about the minimum wage jobs is right on. Go to Illinois or Michigan’s legislature and say, “my franchised restaurant will move to your state and bring in 50,000 minimum wage jobs”. Would they turn you down?

Evan Thomas is a sleek, vaguely poofty widdle wiburul editor of a Texas coffee-table magazine for people with money and big, fancy coffee tables. He has a PBS interview show, and his ideal interviews are people like Danny Glover, Gore Vidal (interviewed 'em both) and the late Louise Nevelson (missed her).

This statement of his in the (notice it's the) WaPo is inaccurate, and showoffily so:

Perry is more hard-knuckled in his dealings not only with Democrats (now a minority in the House and the Senate) but with insufficiently conservative Republicans — what we in Texas pejoratively call “moderates.”.....

In the recent session of the Lege, the RiNO speaker of the Texas House, a man returned to the speakership by a party-line vote of the Democratic minority, ginned up a decennial redistricting plan that paired eight of the most conservative Republicans in the house against one another and guaranteed future Democratic gains, and Rick Perry did absolutely NOTHING about it.

Rick Perry also did not fight for a bill that would have ended the "sanctuary cities" policies of a number of big-city Democratic mayors, including former Houston mayors Kathy Whitmire, Bob Lanier, Lee P. Brown, and Bill White (a former chairman of the Texas Democratic Party and last year's Democratic candidate for governor, opposing Perry). One would have expected Perry, if he were a REAL conservative, to have clubbed "sanctuary" policies out of the park, especially considering that his opponent was a champion of such policies and had had a couple of his Houston police patrolmen murdered on duty by illegal aliens armed with pistols.

There is no way that a Congress Woman with little to no executive experience, or any major accomplishments during her career, can dominate a share of support or votes against a strong candidate like Perry.

Perry will rapidly get name recognition and easily beat Romney. He already has, even with Bachmann having won the Ames poll.

The MSM seems to be choosing him, so that means they think BO can beat him.

Last night I caught a rebroadcast of Michael Medved, and he was interviewing .... <drum roll> Lanny Davis, Slick Willie's impeachment attorney (none other!) and asking Davis, Medved's personal friend from the good old college days, about Republican candidates.

Lanny didn't have a lot to say about Sarah (oh, no, don't talk about Sarah, guys!), but he said flatly Michele's not electable. He said nice things about Mitt Romney, T-Paw, and Rick Perry, though, allowing for various missteps (such as calling Fedhead Helicopter Ben "treasonable" or some such).

Lanny Davis's imprimatur ought to warm hearts all over conservativedom for Mittens and Rick.

See, ya got to go after the middle positions..... the warmed-over mush of MOR Republicanism, "Me-Too'erism", "I Like Ike" GOP-ness. That's what sets voters on fire for the GOP and sets 'Rat whiskers twitching with worry ...... NOT!!!

You CANNOT..in 2012...run ANY political campaign that is ambiguous about your immigration position in the current job market.

Unemployed Americans are looking for assurances of their governments concern about THEIR plight...not that of businesses forced into looking for disposable labor because of onerous tax and regulatory policy.

Illegal Labor is the Feds out for preserving the status quo regarding Taxes and Regulation...and is the ultimate litmus test as to the candidates in question commitment to meaningful regulatory and tax reform. If they are wishy-washy on the subject...they have no real intent to disturb the DC status quo...no matter how big their cowboy hat and six-gun.

No one is perfect. No one on the R side is as bad as zerO. We have no idea how anyone will govern once in office. We have been lied to and betrayed by every conservative candidate on one issue or another. Our conservatives are picky and they can be rolled by the press. They can be manipulated into not voting, if there is no one pure enough to satisfy them. And if there is such a mythical candidate, they are destroyed by the media and therefore never have a chance.

However, we know how bad the zerO has been, is and will be. We have seen a coup over the past three years. Illegal immigration, to take your specific issue in your post, was at least stymied by the House GOP, so zerO simply used his Executive Powers to institute defacto amnesty.

You want more of that?

I know a lot of people who are saying “Let it all crash”, “Let people discover what it is like under communism, so they will rebel, we can have a revolution and rebuild on the ashes.” What if they don’t rebel? What if they can’t rebel because they need the Federal Government to eat and keep a roof over their heads? What if the revolution fails to materialize or, if it does, is short-lived and simply fails under Federal power?

I am not pushing any candidate, at the moment. I am old enough to be irrelevant to the progressives, anyway. But I will at the very least not be a willing party to the re-election of the zerO.

So, which candidate - now or likely to run and have a chance at winning supports deporting 12+million illegals?

(crickets)

None them. There may be strong sentiment for this among a high number of Americans but not among the majority of Americans. WE lost. Deportation is not going to happen.

The best possible REALISTIC solution, will end up being real border controls to STOP the flood of illegals, a system of worker registration, with some controls and conditions over who is eligible- or not- to apply for citizenship... maybe a decision to end or severely limit birthright citizenship (you think a democrat will lead that one?) And some return to ensuring national pride, assimilation and loyalty to the US are part of the citizenship process.

Plus a foreign policy team and ideology that stops groveling to Mexico, stops kissing up to other despots and radicals in Central America, and expects brown people to deal with their own corruption that is tearing their countries apart and adding to our own instability.

Oh, and defund and SCREW La RAZA.

So who do you think will serve our national interests better in tackling immigration and putting us on path to stop the abuses and to stop this being a destructive issue?

obama/napolitano/Eric Holder? or Rick Perry and his administration?

Some conservatives can hold out for mass deportation all they want. But mass deportations of mostly economic refugees in this day and age is not going to happen. It's not the popular majority view, no politician will do it, it's not going to happen. Hold your breath until yo turn blue- it's not going to happen. Refuse to make a donation or to vote. Its not goinmg to happen. Elect Sarah Palin, Jim DeMint, Bobby Jindal, Paul Ryan, Ron Paul - or pick a name - it's not going to happen. Stand on the principle of deportation. It's not going to happen. The flood will just go around you.

So please consider voting for the guy you most trust at the floodgates. obama, or not-obama.

47
posted on 08/20/2011 5:10:06 AM PDT
by silverleaf
(The super rich do not pay taxes, they collect taxes.)

Perry's knocked for the "TTC" but those who use it as a "bad" mark against Perry, don't know beans about it

They know more about it than you appear to.

At least Carole Keeton Foghorn Leghorn is a Texan. The King of Spain isn't. Neither are many of Rick Perry's other plutocratic backers, and the people behind the SPP/NASCO supercorridor, only the Texas portion of which was actually called the "TTC", "Trans-Texas Corridor".

Neither are the Bilderbergers to whom Rick has been busily turning in his annual report card the last few years.

If you read up on Rick Perry, one of the blocs opposing strong immigration control in Texas is the business community. Not big business, but small-medium business. This is the core constituency of the GOP. When it comes to business, a lot of these guys are “Tea Party” libertarians who oppose govt telling them they can’t hire competent people for the cheapest wage. They can foresee popular resentment of foreign workers waning when the economy improves, as it will- under the right administration. Besides, why impose a lot of background checks and other rules on business community when the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT won’t enforce the uS Constitution?

So what is a state governor supposed to do?

The “Tea Party” is not “one voice” on many issues. On immigration, they can’t have their cake and eat it too.

49
posted on 08/20/2011 5:20:47 AM PDT
by silverleaf
(The super rich do not pay taxes, they collect taxes.)

There may be strong sentiment for this among a high number of Americans but not among the majority of Americans. WE lost. Deportation is not going to happen

Don't be so quick to spread cynicism and despair. Cynicism about major 'Rats like Obozo, Durbin the Turban, and Joe Biteme is well-placed, but not about people like Michele and Sarah.

Notice that Arizona achieved, in relatively short order, a reversal of the human tide into their State by passing salutary laws and signaling a new reluctance to assume the supine position favored by former governor Janet Napolitano, who is now a Major Offender and Codefendant in the Obama Administration.

Vote for the right Republican, you get the right policies. Seeing those differences is now seasonable, since it's primary time. Time to start seeking the right candidate.

And it isn't Rick Perry, by the way. He is part of the Open Borders Lobby.

Disclaimer:
Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual
posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its
management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the
exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.